Lahaina school gets
new trailer for classes

LAHAINA >> King Kamehameha III School special education students who have been studying under a tent will get to have classes indoors again after a temporary trailer arrived weeks earlier than projected.

"We're just thrilled that it's here," said Principal Lindsay Ball. "A lot of things had to happen to make it get here in a short time."

The plight of the special education students attracted media attention last week, including an article in last Wednesday's Star-Bulletin.

Barry Wurst, a special education teacher at the school who criticized the state for not providing proper classrooms, said he was grateful for the coverage and thought the attention accelerated the arrival of the trailer yesterday.

Ball said he hopes to begin classes in the trailer Monday.

Several school programs, including special education classes for 21 students from third through fifth grade, were displaced a couple months ago, when the portable classroom building they were to occupy was condemned by inspectors because of termite rot.

The state Department of Accounting and General Services had provided a trailer to house some of the displaced programs and services at the start of school, including special education students in lower grades, a speech therapist and a communications aide.

Ball said the additional trailer will provide classroom space for special education students mainly in the fourth and fifth grades and English as a second language.

Ball said an occupational therapist who lost her space as a result of the condemnation will "float" without an office, and the kupuna program, also displaced from the condemned portable, has been relocated to the cafeteria stage.

The trailer was initially projected to arrive at the school in about three weeks but arrived at King Kamehameha III in less than a week, following complaints from some west Maui teachers and residents.

State Comptroller Russ Saito said after some discussion, his department and the trailer maker Hawaii Modular were able to get an earlier barge date from Young Brothers Ltd.

Saito said the trailer that arrived yesterday had been scheduled to be sent this school year to accommodate other programs at King Kamehameha III School.

The school, one of two elementary schools serving west Maui, has experienced rising enrollment, with about 700 students at the end of the school year in June when it was projected to have 627 pupils.

Preliminary figures indicate enrollment is at 700 for the start of the school year, Ball said.

Meanwhile, a building expert is expected to determine if the condemned portable classroom building has a structural base solid enough to be reconstructed.